ACC All Access: Virginia Tech's Erick Green takes player of the year honors on my All-ACC ballot

After much deliberation, hand-wringing and sweating, my All-ACC ballot has been filed. Here’s what I came up with (feel free to poke holes in it – that’s what these ballots are for, right?…to be critiqued, slammed and essentially laughed at?):

I'll skip right to my player of the year decision-making process. It came down to Larkin and Green on my ballot, and not surprisingly, it was close.

Despite Tech's absolutely rancid 13-18 overall record and last-place 4-14 conference mark, Green's prolific scoring is hard to ignore. Larkin is the catalyst and floor leader of the best team in the ACC, but his numbers don't stand alone on a national level.

After scoring a career-high tying 35 points Sunday in Tech’s loss at Wake Forest, including 27 in the second half, Green continues to lead the nation in scoring with an average of 25.4 points per game. He’s about to become the first player from a major conference to lead the nation in scoring since 1994, when Purdue’s Glenn Robinson scored just over 30 points per game.

Green has done it while shooting 48.2 percent from the floor, which is second-best among ACC guards (behind only North Carolina’s Reggie Bullock, 49.3 percent). Green also leads the ACC in free throw attempts (265). He’s third in the ACC in free throw shooting percentage (81.5), and stayed mindful of his point guard duties by finishing sixth in the conference in assists per game (3.9).

In my mind, coach of the year was a no-brainer. Larranaga's team was predicted by media to finish fifth in the ACC during the regular season, but the Hurricanes ended up winning the conference title.

Scott was endorsed by several ACC coaches as the conference's peskiest defender. I came close to putting Snaer on the all-defensive team, but Larkin edged him out on my ballot.

Tough call for rookie of the year, considering Hanlan and Sulaimon were both worthy.

Sulaimon faded down the stretch, averaging just 4.3 points per game in Duke's last four games. He shot 30.4 percent from the floor (7 of 23) in those games, including just 9 percent (1 of 11) from 3-point range. On the other hand, Hanlan finished strong, scoring in double figures in his last seven games while shooting 51.9 percent (41 of 79) from the floor in those games.

I also looked at how Hanlan and Sulaimon played against ranked opponents. Hanlan averaged 14.4 points per game and shot 47.2 percent from the floor in five games against ranked competition, while Sulaimon put up 12.2 points per game and shot just 35.4 percent in six games against ranked foes.